You know what?! Having a mind like a tombola (even with the door open) is sometimes a good thing – out pop thoughts, emotions and experiences that seem unconnected but when they land simultaneously, I sometimes spot the something that pulls them all together.

I already had a blog piece sketched out for this week, based around fitting changes into your life bit by bit, (‘bird by bird’ for any writers) or for everyone else – “When eating an elephant, take one bite at a time”(US Army General Creighton Williams Abrams Jr. 1914–74)

However, the focus and intent I had with that piece diminished with a whole host of events including a little scare with a breast biospy. That set me running after the hare again. I wasn’t conscious of being especially worried – more, it was another reminder that time can be surprisingly foreshortened and there’s still a lot I want to achieve but I don’t get around to.

All’s ok by the way, but suddenly university prospectuses were flying through the mail as I started sorting Max’s future – cramming a few years parenting into the space of a week! (He has 4 more school years to complete before university..So, you can laugh!)

A number of different conversations over the last few weeks have also been churning through my mind. Among them, chatting to my Mum; it only hit me properly that she’d spent two years in hospital as a teenager battling tuberculosis – she was telling me tales of patients sleeping outside in the snow and I suddenly thought “There’s no record of this anywhere!”

More poignant, I’ve recently been talking to a couple of people with stage 4 cancer – both feeling an urgency to record who they are – without writing 80,000 words.

It’s something I attempted, but struggled a lot with, when I was diagnosed back in 2000 – as writing letters to a 2 year old didn’t give a flavour of me as a person – and where do you begin anyway? I’ve wondered for a while what other approaches might be better. Drawing on some of the simple approaches to coaching, I’ve had a go at generating a few questions for one person, to see if it helps elicit something personal and fun to share with her children.

But churning the tombola a further time, after I had a go at my first piece of flash fiction last week (thank you Charli Mills!), I thought it might also be creative to share some bite-sized memoir through this blog, as I am Sharing the Story.

So what is bite-size memoir?

Bite-size memoir is simply a small record of memories about yourself / friend / grandparent etc, that is deliberately restricted in length and topic, to keep it achievable in a short space of time.

Overtime I hope I can eat another elephant without much effort! I wonder if there are some of you that might find it either a useful exercise, or an opportunity to ponder on some aspects of your own life, regardless of your situation.

But what if I’m not a writer!?

I really don’t think it matters. And I think I have a ‘tool’ to help anyway:

I’ve recently been tackling one particularly difficult period in the ‘big memoir’. It was such a bad time, I cannot tell a story with it. In the end I’ve ‘borrowed’ from Joe Brainard’s Memoir: “I Remember”, which is a simple collection of ‘I remember’ statements.

There’s an amazing beauty in the simplicity of “I Remember” that doesn’t require any great skill with prose. The interest in it, is the individuality of experience in so many things we all share and recognise.Listento him read an extract from “I Remember” to see what I mean.

So what I would love to do, is to share some bite-sized memoir with you. There’s no commitment required to do it every week. Feel free to dip in and out as the mood takes you. If you would like to join in, click on the #bitesizememoir tag near the top left of this post to see the latest prompt.

Here’s how its going to work:

THE BITE-SIZE MEMOIR CHALLENGE

Each Friday I’ll suggest a topic by 2pm UK time (BST) via my blog and Twitter (using the hashtag #BiteSizeMemoir – You don’t need either to participate.)

2. The challenge will be to write about the topic using

either

10 x “I remember statements”

or

150 x words (prose, or poem if you want to stretch yourself)

Either will make you pick and choose your words carefully whilst keeping a tight focus for time’s sake. You might want to write more, to keep at home, but please only submit one option within the limits for sharing (i.e. 10 statements or 150 word prose/poem)

Remember a ‘flavour of who you are’ perhaps comes more from the events, emotions, relationships and actions that stand out for you rather than dates, facts and figures.

3. I will aim to compile responses and share them via another post, a week later – Friday morning, before the next challenge is issued.

4. Therefore, the Deadline for sharing your ‘Bite’ will be 2pm (BST) on the Thursday. You can share in either of two ways:

either

a) Post your response in the comments section of the current topic – I will find it and cut and paste to the compilation of responses. (If you are a first-time commenter on my blog, WordPress will filter you so I can check for spam and you may not see your comment appear immediately but don’t worry – I will find and share it)

or

b) If you have a blog you can post your response on your own blog and provide the link in the comments section of the challenge you’re responding to as well as your own post.

5. Give your response a title that includes the challenge prompt of the week – include the year you were born – I won’t enforce this but I think it provides a significant context for other readers.

A few rules:

If you need or want to be anonymous that’s fine – When you post a comment just put ‘Anon’ or a nickname in the name field. It does ask for an email address as part of spam filtering but only I see it.

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Lisa Reiter

My name is Lisa and in 2000, aged 34, I was diagnosed with terminal cancer (Endometrial Stromal Sarcoma) and given less than 6 months to live. After floundering around getting my head around cancer not being as curable as the adverts of the time were suggesting, I delved into an unknown and for me, a then uncomfortable world of 'alternative' therapies.
Fifteen years on, I'm still here. As my oncologist said at one point, I'm an 'experiment of one' which means no scientist would like to draw conclusions! However, I am far from alone in getting success from looking to diet and mind-body techniques to help my body to do its own healing.
It was several years before I was out of the woods and in 2008, I went 'down' with post traumatic stress disorder related to the trauma of facing death and leaving my young son, motherless. Having been through successful treatment for that, my interest in psychology was rekindled and I went on to do an MSc in Memory and Its Disorders.
I was just getting going pursuing coaching psychology when the loss of three friends to cancer way, way before their time, shook me to the core once again. It reminded me that every second needs to count. After many requests and much support from friends, family, my ever tolerant husband and now, a publisher, I am finally getting my story down on paper.
I aim to tell it honestly but to focus on the positive and what I have learned along the way. I'm using this blog to keep me company as well as discuss the challenges of writing about it all. I also hope to check my understanding of what others might want to hear about.
If I manage to inspire just one person to feel a bit more in control of their own battle, the writing will all have been worth while.